News

Thursday, April 27, 2017

People: A Toronto-based makeup enthusiast wants to propel the availability of beauty products specific to black women in the makeup industry. TAJJ Cosmetics is the brainchild of it’s founder June Smith, a Jamaican-Canadian lover of cosmetics, who started the company in 2008 out of necessity, she said. Comments (3)

Wednesday, April 26, 2017

Sports: Former West Indies fast bowler Jerome Taylor has come out of retirement from Test cricket and has indicated he is again available for selection to the regional side.
Taylor 32, who stepped down from Test cricket last July says he is ready to play for the West Indies. Comment

Thursday, April 20, 2017

Manhattan: The Barbados-based Caribbean Tourism Organization (CTO) says Caribbean Week New York will come alive in the Big Apple in early June with a celebration of the sights, sounds, color, cuisine and culture of the Caribbean. Comment

Wednesday, April 19, 2017

Brooklyn: The Walentas Family Foundation announced this week that applications are now open for its Neighborhood School Grants, an annual program to support innovative projects in Brooklyn School Districts 13 and 14. Comment

Movies: Behind the White Glasses (Unrated) Musical tribute to Italian filmmaker Lina Wertmuller, the first female to land Oscar nominations for Best Director, Best Original Screenplay and Best Foreign Film. Featuring commentary by Martin Scorcese, Sophia Loren and Harvey Keitel. (In English and Italian with subtitles) Comment

Saturday, April 15, 2017

Health: The Washington, D.C.-based Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) is inviting entries for a contest that will recognize outstanding health promotion practices developed by cities, schools, universities and institutions of higher education in the Americas, including the Caribbean. Comment

Thursday, April 13, 2017

Suriname: Street protests and labor union unrest have in recent weeks seriously hit two South American countries with very close relations to the Caribbean Community with both having much to do with declining living conditions, crime and feelings that governments are not listening. Comment

Barbados: Verbal sparring between trades unions and Barbados Government appears headed to the next level with a pay dispute between teachers and the Ministry of Education becoming the most recent spark that threatens to ignite into an inferno. Comment

Formed just over three years ago, the Brooklyn-based Vincentian group Friends of Sion Hill, Inc. (FOSH) is already making a huge difference in the lives of many in the community in New York and at home in St. Vincent and the Grenadines. Comment

National: UNITED NATIONS, April 5, 2017 (IPS) - The U.S. has withdrawn all of its funding to the UN Population Fund (UNFPA), an agency that works on family planning and reproductive health in over 150 countries. Comment

Guyana: A Guyanese bipartisan select parliamentary committee is set to pore over draft petroleum legislation that would include jail time and heavy fines for locals and industry players who take bribes from oil operators and will also have clauses aimed at ensuring that the country is not cheated of its resources as Guyana prepares for actual oil production in late 2019-2020. Comments (1)

Arts & Theater: The Caribbean American immigrant experience comes forth in a new musical highlighting some common themes of the Diaspora. “Welcome to America: A Caribbean Musical,” is a musical about one undocumented immigrant attempting to find her dreams and learning some life lessons along the way. Comment

Wednesday, April 12, 2017

Fashion: Young fashion designer, Tyyan Rae Williams continues to make waves on the runway since unveiling her line of playful Pinky Sez children’s collection at Brooklyn Fashion Week at a very young age. Comments (2)

Sports: While West Indies scored a historic record-breaking win in the opening One-Day International (ODI) of the Q Mobile Cup Series against Pakistan at the Guyana National Stadium on Friday, they faltered badly in the second match to slump to a 74-run defeat two days later. Comment

Books: Each Sunday, your family has a routine they follow.
Everyone gets up early to the smells of a good breakfast that Mama makes; she serves all your favorites before you go to church to raise your voice and praise God. Comment

Tuesday, April 11, 2017

Brooklyn Borough President Eric L. Adams has proclaimed April as Financial Education Empowerment Month in Brooklyn, highlighting his fourth annual month-long program of activities to coincide with National Financial Literacy Month Comment

Music: A new music streaming service Selecta Charts will be Barbados’ first to stream music for free. The platform, which is the brainchild of founder and creator Paul Husbands, was an idea that came to fruition after attending a Canadian cultural festival, which explored the popularity of soca music access in the country, he said. Husbands said after the national Crop Over festival, soca music dies down. Comment

Jamaica: In an unprecedented show of remorse and humility, the government of Jamaica took responsibility for a single incident that blamed the island’s total Rastafarian population for the death of eight individuals in a farming community 10 miles east of the second city of Montego Bay 54 years ago. Comments (1)

Music: Woodstock, New York is renowned for the rockfest held in 1969 that attracted thousands of music-lovers hankering for an outdoor communal gathering of like-minded rock and roll aficionados. Comment

Monday, April 10, 2017

Haiti: PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) – Aspasie Tanis lives hand-to-mouth on the edge of eviction in the best of times, scraping out a living selling packets of spaghetti and cookies outside her low-slung concrete shack in Haiti’s capital. Now the death of her father by stroke threatens to send her into a lifetime of debt. Comment

Music: Vy Higginsen and The Mama Foundation for The Arts announces their Spring 2017 Season with the revival of the hit musical ALIVE! 55+ and Kickin’ at The Dempsey Theater in Harlem, New York on Thursday, April 27, 2017 at 7 pm, followed by Saturday matinees on May 6, 13 and 20 at 1 pm. Comment

Movies: Released in 1979, “Going in Style” revolved around a trio of retirees who break the monotony of their dreary daily lives by robbing a bank. That critically-acclaimed, comic caper co-starred a trio of entertainment icons in George Burns, Art Carney and the legendary Lee Strasberg, the father of method acting. Comment

Sunday, April 9, 2017

Sports: Former West Indies captain Sir Viv Richards has slammed West Indies Cricket Board administrators for their failure to ensure the best players in the region remain available for international duty. Comment

Music: In the tradition of excellence always associated with Vy Higginsen, The Mama Foundation for the Arts launches The Harlem Gospel Concert Series starring Vy Higginsen’s Gospel Choir from Harlem at The Dempsey Theater, 127 West 127th St. starting April 15 and continuing the first three Saturdays in May (6, 13 & 20). Comment

Saturday, April 8, 2017

St Vincent: The United Stat Department’s International Narcotics Control Strategy Report (INCRS) has branded the Eastern Caribbean (EC) as a “transit point for drug traffickers going to the United States and Europe.” Comment

Caribbean: A new report by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) has urged Latin America and the Caribbean to move aggressively towards a more integrated regional trade area to boost exports, protect from increasingly difficult global trading environment, and spur firms to become more productive and join global supply chains. Comment

Haiti: The technology capital of the country is looking for Caribbean creatives to be a part of their initiative to improve the environment and the lives of people living in the region. Singularity University, a global educational technology organization based in California, is asking Caribbean entrepreneurs and innovators to present a startup idea that will change the livelihood and scope of climate in the Caribbean. Comments (2)

Brooklyn: Mayor Bill deBlasio on Sunday bestowed special honor on his former City Council colleague, Dr. Una S.T. Clarke, and her Brooklyn-based Progressive Democrats Political Association (PDPA) at a gala ceremony commemorating the 25th anniversary of the group that was founded by Clarke. Comments (1)

Arts & Theater: The Jamaican Consulate in New York celebrated some of the country’s most talented at an exhibit in Manhattan on March 31. The “Literary Salon, Jewelry, and Art Exhibit” highlighted the artwork, literature, and designs from Jamaican authors, artists, and designers, as part of honoring Jamaica’s 55th year of independence. Comment

Thursday, April 6, 2017

Once again, leaders of several Caribbean governments, which are shareholders in the main lifeline air service to most of the countries in the Caribbean trade group have been forced to intervene to avert a major crisis, albeit with the peak Easter holiday travel period looming Comment

Guyana: During a departure procedure on April 2, 2017, at Cheddi Jagan International Airport in Guyana, a ticket agent told this reporter, that a departure tax is no longer payable at check-in, he said the fee is now billed into the airline ticket at time of purchase. Comment

Food: Jomo Kwame Sundaram is a former economics professor who served as a senior UN official during 2005-2015. Tan Zhai Gen is an University of Oxford biochemistry graduate currently involved in research. Both are Malaysians.
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, April 4, 2017 (IPS) - The greatly excessive use of antibiotics in food production in recent decades has made many bacteria more resistant to antibiotics. Comment

Music: He’s all flute, no suit!
A Trinidadian flutist is hoping to change the image of his instrument! At his concert at the Brooklyn Conservatory of Music on April 7, David Bertrand plans to don a cool, casual outfit and demonstrate that the silvery woodwind can take a leading role in a jazz quartet. Comment

Wednesday, April 5, 2017

Environment: BRIDGETOWN, Barbados, April 4, 2017 (IPS) - From tourism-dependent nations like Barbados to those rich with natural resources like Guyana, climate change poses one of the biggest challenges for the countries of the Caribbean. Comment

Viewpoints: As people across this country debate multiple issues around discrimination and the government’s role in them, here in New York, the City Council is seeking a law that would effectively create its own form of government-mandated discrimination. Comment

St Vincent: The three-year-old Friends of Sion Hill, Inc. Saturday evening bestowed its Lifetime Achievement Award on former St. Vincent and the Grenadines’ New York Deputy Consul General Cyril “Scorcher” Thomas at the group’s Second Annual Black-Tie Awards Ceremony and Dance at the Friends of Crown Heights Educational Center in Brooklyn. Comment

Tuesday, April 4, 2017

Immigration: Even as United States President Donald J. Trump has stepped up immigration enforcement, creating an atmosphere of fear among Caribbean and other immigrant communities that extends to the courtroom, a Caribbean immigration attorney in Brooklyn says there is still hope of nationals to adjust their status even though they had entered the US without inspection or had overstayed their visa. Comment

St Vincent: The rain held up, after drenching New York almost non-stop for over 24 hours, but it was very cold and blustery, as Vincentians braved the elements on Saturday morning, April, to demonstrate their fervent support for national athletes participating in this year’s Penn Relays Carnival, at the Franklin Field Stadium, University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. Comment

St Vincent: KINGSTOWN, St. Vincent, March 30, 2017 (IPS) - In the 1980s, an institution for troubled Danish youth and a vocational school for Vincentians was built in Richmond Vale, an agricultural district on the northwestern tip of St. Vincent. Comment

Brooklyn: It was no April Fools’ joke that on the first day of this month thousands congregated, ran, walked, rode, in celebration of a green space marking a century and half of existence in New York. Comment

Arts & Theater: PARIS, March 29, 2017 (IPS) — It’s one of those movie-like spring days in Paris, where blue skies and brilliant sunshine lift spirits after a long, wet, grey winter. Many people are outdoors trying to catch the rays, but Jamaican artist Danny Coxson is not among them. He’s inside a museum in a northeastern neighbourhood of the French capital, with a brush in his hand and tubs of vivid paint beside him, focusing on finishing a portrait of a deejay named Big Youth. Comment

Sports: West Indies failed to capitalize on the previous day when they blasted Pakistan to a three-wicket win in just 14.5 of their allotted 20 overs in the third of their four International Twenty 20 series at the Queen’s Park Oval, in Trinidad. Comment

Eight courses.
You seriously doubted if the food was ever going to stop coming, though you hoped it wouldn’t: you’d tasted all your favorite dishes, and then some. It was a meal fit for a king or queen. Or maybe a president, and in “The President’s Kitchen Cabinet” by Adrian Miller, you’ll read about First Family feasts. Comment

Monday, April 3, 2017

Immigration: Even as legislators and immigrant advocacy groups express outrage over the Donald Trump administration’s immigration policies, United States Attorney General Jeff Sessions has announced the expansion and modernization of a program to deport immigrants, including Caribbean nationals, in US federal correctional facilities. Comment

Music: Scores of New York City media representatives, artists, music industry executives, tastemakers and sponsors came out to the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Queens, New York last Saturday morning for the 2017 launch of Groovin’ In The Park, New York City’s premier reggae & R&B summer concert. Comment

Sunday, April 2, 2017

People: From a homeless teen to executive in the finance scene.
Washington Heights native Emily Quezada went from living in a shelter after being thrown out of her home at 18 years old and pregnant, and now at 25 she is a finance executive with online travel agency CheapOair. Comment

Food: Several Caribbean countries have banned the sale of corned beef and importation of the meat product from Brazil, following reports that several meat processors in the South American country have allegedly been selling rotten beef and poultry. Comment

Brooklyn: Brooklyn Council Member Jumaane D. Williams, deputy leader and chair of the City Council Committee on Housing and Buildings, has hailed a ruling of a New York State Supreme Court judge to uphold rent freeze for tenants of the city’s rent stabilized housing. Comment

Music: Soca artist Fay-Ann Lyons’ aptly titled album “Break the World,” went on to smash the international world when it charted at number three on Billboard’s Reggae and Soca billboard after its debut. Comment

Movies: Aftermath (R for one scene containing graphic violence) Fact-based docudrama about a grief-stricken vigilante (Arnold Schwarzenegger) who seeks to take revenge on the air traffic controller (Scoot McNairy) whose mistake led to the crash which claimed the lives of his wife and daughter. Supporting cast includes Maggie Grace, Kevin Zegers and Hannah Ware. Comment

Friday, March 31, 2017

St Vincent: More than 500 Vincentian and other Caribbean nationals Sunday evening paid their last respects to Vincentian masman and football (soccer) pioneer Sam DeBique, who died on March 15. He was 79 Comment

Brooklyn: TFOA-Professional Preparatory Charter School in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn, is in the business of helping every student recognize and develop their potential to grow into an exceptional human being and to use their skills, talents and knowledge to change the world in positive ways. This ambitious project seems entirely achievable when explained with enthusiasm and focus by Professional Prep’s co-founder and managing partner, Rafiq Kalam Id-Din. Comment

Manhattan: A Harlem-based lending company launched a business initiative to support women and minority-owned businesses in the city. The Harlem Commonwealth Council lending sector — the Harlem Entrepreneurial Fund — created the free program ‘Opportunity for Growth’ that will teach and assist participants with sessions on financial education and literacy, marketing, and the do’s and don’ts of running a business. Comment

Trinidad and Tobago: Barbados
Health authorities in Barbados are urging nationals to educate themselves more about sexually transmitted infections (STI) as the island deals with an outbreak of syphilis. Comment

Thursday, March 30, 2017

Music: Cuban pianist Elio Villafranca is returning with his Letters to Mother Africa series, this time with “Cuba – Senegal: Letters to Mother Africa II” at Aaron Davis Hall on March 31. The concert will be an extension of his first installment, this time highlighting African roots of Cuban music and connecting a relationship between Cuban and Senegalese music, he said. Comment

Wednesday, March 29, 2017

Caribbean: Caribbean sugar producers are once again scrambling to adopt to new measures by their main buyers in Europe largely because the decades-old system of fixed quantity quotas for raw cane sugar exports from the region will come to a crashing end in September. Comment

As the International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade was celebrated on Saturday, the United Nations says the legacy of the transatlantic slave trade endures. Comment

Health: Natalia Linou is policy specialist Gender, Health and HIV at the UN Development Program
UNITED NATIONS, March 24, 2017 (IPS) - Physical injuries are some of the more visible, and at times most deadly, consequences of gender-based violence (GBV). But the long-term mental health consequences are often invisible and left untreated. Comment

Jamaica: Shackelia Jackson is the sister of Nakiea who was killed by the Jamaican police in 2014.
KINGSTON, Jamaica, March 22, 2017 (IPS) - As a relative of a young man killed by the police in Kingston, Jamaica, many people have asked me how my family copes with the pain, with having lost a part of us, with the immense frustration of not having found justice for Nakiea. Comment

Tuesday, March 28, 2017

Guyana: Medgar Edgar College’s [MEC] President Dr. Rudolph Crew has said that the visit of the president of the Republic of Guyana to the Crown Heights-based college in April continues “an important tradition” at the predominantly Black Brooklyn school. Comment

Brooklyn: The second annual Senior Resource Fair, a four-hour exposition that showcases helpful resources for seniors, returns to Clinton Hill on March 29. The fair organized by the Senior Council of the Myrtle Avenue Revitalization Project was in high demand from neighborhood seniors, said an organizer for the fair. Comment

People: Brooklyn Assembly Member Rodneyse Bichotte on Sunday, March 26 endorsed Mayor Bill de Blasio for re-election, citing his strong record of improving public schools, creating affordable housing for working families and improving relations between police and the communities they serve. Comment

New York: In collaborative efforts between New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio’s office and the City’s Department of Small Business Services, applications are now open for minorities and women in small business to access more loans to expand their businesses. Comment

Jamaica: On the 55th anniversary celebration of Jamaica’s independence, the images of two multiple Olympic gold medal winners will be immortalized with the unveiling of statues at the National Stadium Statue Park in Kingston. Comment

Monday, March 27, 2017

St Lucia: The St. Lucia’s Prime Minister Allan Chastanet is making another call for an international agreement to deal with the issue of criminal deportees, saying the matter should be discussed at the level of the United Nations Comment

Brooklyn: Fresh from a successful medical mission to Guyana that included a Cancer Awareness walk, in collaboration with the Giving Hope Foundation, members and friends of the Health Education and Relief Organization For Cancer Inc. (HEROC) will dress to impress on Sunday, April 23, at its Annual Tea Party and Hat Parade, to raise funds to continue its urgent work. Comment

Movies: Aftermath (R for one scene containing graphic violence) Fact-based docudrama about a grief-stricken vigilante (Arnold Schwarzenegger) who seeks to take revenge on the air traffic controller (Scoot McNairy) whose mistake led to the crash which claimed the lives of his wife and daughter. Supporting cast includes Maggie Grace, Kevin Zegers and Hannah Ware. Comment

Sunday, March 26, 2017

Movies: Legendary jazz great Lee Morgan (1938-1972) was born and raised in Philadelphia where he received his first trumpet as a gift from his sister on his 13th birthday. He soon became a protege of Clifford Brown who would die in a car accident at the tender age of 25. Comment

Thursday, March 23, 2017

Once again, authorities in Trinidad are tapping into a special rainy day fund to help finance a deficit 2017 budget, ailing in part because of the prolonged depression of oil and gas prices on the international market and for petroleum-related products in general. Comment

Guyana: The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) says it has organized the first forum on gender and transport in Georgetown, Guyana, with the objective of creating a space for the exchange of information between public policymakers, researchers and transport experts on how to incorporate the gender perspective into the transport sector to promote greater gender equality in the Caribbean Community (CARICOM)-member state. Comment

Tuesday, March 21, 2017

Brooklyn: Councilman Mathieu Eugene (D—East Flatbush) presented a check of $1.4 million to Kings County Hospital earlier this month. The hospital was awarded the money by the city council to purchase the latest modernized equipment for patients. Comment

St Vincent: With the brand new 9000 ft. Argyle International Airport now in place, Consul General of St, Vincent and Grenadines to New York, H.E. Howie M. Prince, said his country would welcome the arrival of Greensboro North Carolina Dynamic International Airways planned service from JFK to the Eastern Caribbean island in the near future. Comment

Sunday, March 19, 2017

Trinidad and Tobago: Prime Minister Dr. Keith Rowley has brought in former United National Congress (UNC) Attorney General Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj (under the Basdeo Panday administration) to assist the government in resuming hanging in Trinidad and Tobago. Comment

Saturday, March 18, 2017

Sports: Mystery spinner Sunil Narine and hard-hitting batsman Kieron Pollard are among members of the West Indies squad to play Pakistan in the upcoming four Twenty20 matches in the Caribbean later this month. Comment

Friday, March 17, 2017

Capt. Gerry Gouveia, chief executive officer of Roraima Airways, Guyana, and Karen Kraus, interim chief executive officer (CEO) of Greensboro North Carolina, Dynamic International Airways, thanked travel agents and customers for staying with the carrier through turbulent times, and assured customers that the airline is now focused on service recovery that would be seamless. Comments (1)

Raising a child is quite a challenge.
When they’re small, you feel as though the entire world is dangerous. As they grow, you waffle between encouragement and fear, wings for them and tears for you. Teenagers, well, they’re a whole separate category and in the new book “My Brown Baby” by Denene Millner, some parents have even more to worry about. Comment

Wednesday, March 1, 2017

Music: Harlemite Rob Base put together a hip hop group in 5th grade called Sureshot Seven. “A bunch of us put together a little hip hop group. It was fun back then. We had a couple of DJs and MCs. In time we all branched out and did our own thing Comment